The Werewolf and the Moonstone
by dragonflysigh
Summary: Little Remus is hospitalized for a year after being bitten. As a 9 year old who's life has just changed forever, he needed a friend now more than ever. (Cutesy Innocent Kid Romance) (Lupin/OC) A story about the Werewolf's first love.
1. The Werewolf: Part I

**.:: 9 Years Ago ::.**

**:: :: :: :: ::**

**:: :: :: :: ::**

_Hot, foul breath. Deep, gutteral snarls._

_A piercing pressure on his shoulder. **Deeper** the hot teeth sank. **Deeper**._

_Claws sank into his arms. **Deeper**. _

_The beast was enclosing in on in him, sinking his poison. _

_Past the broken skin. Past the mangled flesh. Past the lungs and guts. Past the beating human heart. _

_Deep down, the beast was piercing the boy's core. _

"NOOOO!"

Remus woke up with a scream. He breathed hard and fast in the darkness. All at once, he doubled over in pain.

"Mumma! Papa! Where are you?"

His voice rang out in silence. The starchy bedsheets were not his own. He was enclosed behind four walls of plastic curtain.

Where were his parents? Where?

In his terrified state, he lunged toward the curtains to escape. A wave of hot pain pushed him back on the bed. His hands felt layers of wet, warm bandages on his chest and shoulders, sending a shock of cold terror down his small frame. A soul-splitting scream exploded in his lungs. Over and over he yelled until his vision tore and the world grew dizzy.

_I want to go home…I want to go home…_

Hurried footsteps. A distant light.

"Try not to move, love," An unfamiliar voice came from beside him.

He saw multiple shadows approach him in the dark. Their hands moved fast and touched him all over. He tried to fight.

_I want my mother…I want my mother…_

The last thing he felt was the glowing tip of a wand pressed to his forehead. Darkness consumed him at once.

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It was four days later when Remus woke up again. It was daylight, and the curtains were drawn back. He found himself in the same room. This time he recognized it as a hospital room. With concentrated effort, he called out to his mother who was sleeping in a chair nearby.

Through her tears and cries of joy, he tried to ask what had happened. His father came running into the room to join his mother. They hugged in greatful, prayer-filled silence.

The next few hours of his life were ones that he would often look back on. This was the death of a former Remus who braved childhood with an intact naivety about the world. This was the shattering of ignorance, and the beginning of struggle.

Even in adulthood, he could close his eyes and see his parents' heartbroken faces - watching the Healer walk into the room with his salmon-colored St. Mungo scrubs. An air of formality and no sign of a smile.

The three of them sat down and told Remus a story. Familiar scenes tugged at his memory...

His mother calling him in for dinner.

A twig snapping in the woods.

A blood-red sunset.

Fading light.

The end of something.

"You will be here until the next full moon," The Healer said decisively. "Further actions will be decided once we see if... Once we see what happens."

At 8 years old, he wondered if he should have died instead.

:: :: :: ;; :: ;; :: ;; :: ;; :: ;; :: ;; :: ;; :: ;; :: ;; :::

"Martha, what's this?"

Remus held up a small red box to the nurse who was changing his sheets.

Three weeks of hospital life later and by now, the polite, little Remus knew all the nurses and healers by name in the Critical Care wing. Martha was one of the few nurses who didn't stare at his over-grown arm hair or wince when his sneezes turn into monstrous roars. Instead, the gruff old witch entered the room every day by barking at him to stop scratching his wounds. She liked to carry about her business as usual - as if nothing was out of the ordinary. As if this wasn't the only surviving case in a decade of a werewolf bite on a child this young. As if this child's fate wasn't hung in the air, up for debate until the next full moon.

She was very no-nonsense, which was why Remus was surprised to find her recognizing and smiling at the small red box.

"Looks like a present, don't it?" She went back to changing a pillowcase.

"I found it by my bedside this morning," Remus carefully inspected it. "But mum said it wasn't from her. Is it from you, Martha?"

The old woman snorted in derision, "I have 50 patients a day – all in critical care. When would I have time to make presents for one sickly boy? Even if he is the only –"

The nurse cut short and glanced nervously at Remus. A shadow passed the little boy's face.

"…the only one who won't finish his vegetables," Nurse Martha recovered. She glared down at his lunch tray, "Don't play around with me, boy. Finish it up!"

"I will," Remus grumbled. Under his breath he muttered, "Although I'd really rather have a burger…"

In reality, what he was really craving was a bloody slab of steak. But this thought arose an intense feeling of self-hatred in his stomach. Even his appetite had now changed to serve as a constant reminder of the one thing he tried to forget.

"Well then, I'll notify the CHEFS downstairs," the nurse announced sarcastically.

"Will you tell me who the present is from?" He asked again.

The Nurse packed the dirty sheets onto her cart, and began to wheel it out.

"Why don't you start by checking the card?" She asked mysteriously, and then left the room.

Silence surrounded him. This was the worst part of life at the hospital: The long stretches of day that crawled by when his parents were at work, when the 9-year-old boy was left to himself.

There was an envelope on the table next to his bed. Inside was a crudely-made card with a crayon drawing of moon and stars. It read:

_Don't be afraid! The moon is really quite harmless._

He stared at the child-like hand-writing. Shame washed over him. Was someone playing a joke? Did a kid from back home know his secret? Each time he re-read the card, the words painfully mocked him.

Remus reluctantly unwrapped the red box, expecting something cursed inside. Maybe a voodoo doll of a werewolf.

Instead, he found a small, meteoric-looking stone inside. It was rough all over, except on one side where it was flat and smooth. On the polished surface, small words were engrained:

_My name is Moonstone._

He flipped the rock over and over in his hands, examining the small bubbles of air and granite-colored sheen.

Someone knew that the full-moon was approaching. Someone knew that he lied awake at night, watching the growing, white globe in fear. How could they have known that it was on his mind all day, all night?

"I'm not afraid of the moon," The 9-year-old boy said defensively, twirling the stone in his hands. "I know the moon is just a piece of rock. It's not the piece of rock I'm afraid of…"

He stopped flipping the rock and caught a rare glimmer of blue on the smooth side.

_Afraid of yourself? _

The words had changed.

Remus flung the rock away from him in shock. It skidded along the floor and under the couch.

The rock was alive…or maybe cursed?

He felt a strange irritation at the words_. "Afraid of yourself"…_

To distract himself, he picked up a book and tried not think about the terrifying truth behind that phrase.

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When the full moon came, Remus had lost his memory for a few nights.

There was no recollection of the flesh-splitting transformation. No memory of frantic howling in the iron-clad room. Yet even still, he knew what happened when he woken up a few days later - lungs raw and body sore. Self-inflicted bite-marks covered his body from the lack of animals and humans to bite in that prison cell. His nails were chipped from scratching metal.

His mother and father stared somberly at the floor. One look at Remus and they would give away what they were just realizing: their son would never lead a normal life.

In bed, he listened to the Head Healer explain that life in society as a werewolf was possible. He would need to prepare Wolfsbane before every full moon to gain his human memory during transformation. He had to register his condition of lycanthropy with the ministry. He would undergo treatment to stabilize his cravings for meat. His hair. His need to run wild.

He would never be able to attend a normal wizarding school.

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That night, the moon gleaned innocently from the window. In the shadows, Remus gingerly climbed out of bed and reached under the couch.

He felt the moonstone with his fingers and brought it out under the window. Using the pale light, he read the small engrained words:

_Don't be afraid. You have a friend. _


	2. The Werewolf: Part II

**The Werewolf: Part II**

It was late afternoon. Remus lied in bed flipping mindlessly through a deck of Chocolate Frog cards. Outside his room, healers and nurses bustled in the hallway. Someone was bleeding. Someone was dying. Healers ran around and nurses waved their charts. People came in. People left. In and out. Day after day.

Life continued on while the little werewolf remained in bed, hooked up to a liter of potion-filled IV.

It had been several days since the Moonstone said anything. Remus caught himself frequently checking it, shaking it, wondering when it will come alive again.

Today, on an especially bored occasion, he tried staring it into intimidation.

"Can you hear me…?" He whispered.

The rock stared back. A silent chunk of moon.

Then suddenly…

A small flash of blue.

_Yes. _

He squirmed with excitement. But stopped himself.

"Are you…evil?"

A long pause.

_No. Are you? _

Remus thought about the Healer's words – "Keep yourself away from humans every full-moon. Find a cave. An abandoned place in nature."

"I'm going to try not to be," Remus said sadly.

The rock glimmered reassuringly.

_How old are you? _

Remus felt slightly uncomfortable. He answered anyways, "I'm nine. How old are you?"

He felt foolish sitting by himself in a bed, staring closely at the rock, waiting for a realistic answer.

_9,000,000,000 years old!_

Remus laughed.

"That's pretty old. But I guess that makes sense. Um. Let's see…Where were you born?"

A flash of blue.

_Mars._

"…okay, that DOESN'T make sense."

_On the moon, of course. _

Flash of blue

_ dummy._

"HEY I'm Just making sure! You could be a fake. Maybe you're from the gift shop."

_But just look at me! I'm SHINY! _

"You look like a normal rock to me."

Silence.

_You'll have to go to the moon and see for yourself one day. _

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The next few days felt less lonely for some reason. Even if the rock was not an actual play-mate, Remus enjoyed carrying on conversations – pretending it was an alien from outer-space. He grew less suspicious as time went on and the rock had not tried to explode on him or poison his hands. Even if it were cursed, it had at the very least kept him sane during the long hours of bed-ridden treatment by himself.

After his treatment, he was granted the freedom to explore some parts of the Critical Care wing. The nurses looked the other way when he slipped into waiting rooms to read magazines and watch the other patients. People with interesting bite marks and furniture for limbs would sometimes wander in.

He discovered other bed-ridden patients who were in the hospital for week at a time like Remus. Usually they were not in the state to talk and many of them kept their conditions very secretive. However, every now and then, it was very clear which ones were attacked by magical creatures.

"Grindylow ink makes a wonderful hair dye potion!" proclaimed Zelda, the adventurous old witch next door to his. She was covered in red circles where Grindylow tentacles had suctioned her skin. It was said that she had been attacked by an entire colony of them, but the old lady miraculously survived with a small jar of the ink – the key ingredient to her company's best-selling beauty product.

"Were you afraid to face so many?" Remus asked in awe.

"Of course not," Zelda winced slightly as she spread a balm over her skin. "This happens every time. I'll admit, I'm not as young as I use to be when I first started Zelda's Beauty Potions – but I knew that very well going in. That's why I brought back-up with me. Turns out, no matter how sharply-dressed and suave a wizard may seem in the conference room – he can always be a yellow-bellied bastard in the face of imminent danger. Pardon my french, dear."

The 9-year-old pardoned her.

Remus appreciated the life and color she added to the Critical Care wing. She complained passionately about the nurses turning down her jazz and big band records. She threw furious tantrums when nurses took away her dinner cocktails and morning mimosas. She howled indignantly when they confiscated her cigarettes.

"They'll take away this too unless I hide it." The grumpy witch said applying a vibrant shade of red lipstick. "They say my skin needs to heal without cosmetics. Can you imagine? Telling that to ME, Zelda Priestly, CEO of an international beauty product company?"

She fluffed her frizzy blonde hair in the mirror and placed the lipstick down in a small red box. Remus's eyes widened when he recognized it.

"Miss Zelda – where did you get that lipstick?" He asked, pointing to the box.

"Oh this? Yes, it was the cutest thing," Zelda pointed out in the hall, "That little girl over there dropped it off this morning."

In the hallway, a young girl with long, dark brown hair was leaning tip-toe against the front-desk, chin resting on her arms as she talked to the secretary. She wore a violet frock and a long ribbon in her hair.

Remus said goodbye to Zelda and walked closer to study her.

The girl was around Remus's age, although seemed much more comfortable and talkative in her surroundings. The secretary was laughing and leaned down to kiss her on her head. After an enthusiastic wave goodbye, she spun on her feet and frolicked off into the opposite direction.

Remus instinctively hid himself behind the wall. He waited until she skipped by.

She danced throughout the hospital, stopping now and then to say hello to the Healers and nurses. He made sure to follow a few steps behind.

As he wove in and out of rooms, he scolded himself for being so ridiculously shy. He should just ask her if she was the one who gave him the gift. At least say hi. It was the first child his age he had seen in a month. But he was unreasonably frightened after watching her energetically leap from person to person throughout the hospital. Everyone knew her.

She disappeared through a door. Counting to five, he opened the door to follow after her. The stone steps led him to a kitchen underground.

House-elves merrily marched along in salmon-colored towels, carrying trays of bread and stirring pots of soup.

"Sit down!"

Remus spun around to see the girl sitting on a counter, swinging her legs. Her large blue eyes stared right at him.

Next to her sat a plate where a burger was waiting. Waiting for _him _he realized with dread.

"You knew I was behind you?" He approached her tentatively.

The girl nodded. She picked up her own burgers and sat happily chewing.

"What's your name?" He asked.

The little girl reached inside her pocket and pulled out a smooth stone. She held it to her lips, whispered something, and then stared expectantly at Remus's pocket.

Slowly, he reached inside his pants and pulled out the moonstone.

New words were engrained on it:

_My name is Stella. _


	3. The Werewolf: Part III

The Werewolf: Part III

Surrounded by happy house elves and warmed by a six-foot tall fireplace, the pale girl and sandy-haired boy sat on the kitchen counter, eating burgers.

"How did you know I wanted burgers?" Remus asked.

"You said so that one day." She chewed happily.

"You…heard me?" His eyes widened.

"_Moonstone_ heard you." Stella said.

Stella placed the moonstone near Remus's lips. He mumbled a few words and moments later, they were enscribed on her own rock.

"The Healers use a similar charm on their charts," She said. "To message one another in the hospital."

"How do you know all of them – the healers and nurses and patients?"

She smiled, "I've been here for a long time. My father is a healer here, and I sometimes stay the night during his long shifts."

The more they talked to each other, the less awkward Remus felt. After all, he was sitting underground eating a burger with a girl who spied on him through a rock. Maybe it was the fact that he had so many unanswered questions. Or just the fact that he was lonely for friendship, and the girl was extending kindness through offering him the first meat he had in weeks.

Whatever it was, Remus stayed talking to her. Against all natural his tendencies to shy away from girls his age, he stayed. And for the remaining five months of his hospital stay, he was very glad he did. After all that had happened, he finally felt normal, eating a burger with his newly-made friend.

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As it turned out, most of the long-term residents in the hospital had received a small red box at some point in their stay. He learned this while following Stella on adventures the next few months, sneaking into rooms and slipping these tiny gifts when no was looking. As someone who grew up in hospitals, she was familiar with how desolate the environment could be to patients. Rather than spending her time bored in her father's office, she passed the time organizing these small gift operations that now involved Remus as an accomplice. Although it was now clear to Remus _why _she pursued these projects, he was still puzzled to find out _how_ she knew what to get them every time.

"I just have a_ hunch_he'll need this," She whispered one day, tucking a box near a sleeping old wizard.

"But how do you know?" He asked for the hundredth time.

As usual, she only responded with a smile and then ran to drop off the next present.

It was startling how accurate these "hunches" were. It turned out the crying toddler in Ward A really did need a stuffed bear to calm him at night. And the old woman in 4B just _happened_ to need new knitting needles as well – with matching yarn the exact color of the scarf she worked on at home. Stella tried to convince him that she spent a lot of time eavesdropping on nurses and patients confessing these needs.

And yet, he would never EVER tell anyone, not even Martha, about how afraid he was of the moon.

"You're a werewolf, duh." She was in his room one afternoon playing a game of exploding snap. "I just figured you would be…"

It was a warm afternoon, and Remus was strapped to his bed. Potion dripped through the tubes into his arm.

The last card she placed on the house of cards exploded into a sizzling display of sparkles and confetti. She giggled and clapped her hands.

"Can you not say that too loud." He responded with a mumble.

"What?"

"You know…" He eyed the door. "…werewolf…"

Her eyes widened in confusion, "But…you ARE one."

Remus began to clean up the cards on the bed. His mouth formed a grim line, and he could feel the tips of his ears turn very warm. An uncomfortable silence fell between them. After months of being friends, they still had not confronted this topic. Remus always made sure to steer them away from talking about it. When he was around her, he felt temporarily removed from his life. He could forget about the wolfsbane potion and the scars every month.

Stella sat facing him on his bed, waiting for his reaction. Her head cocked quizzically to the side as she asked, "Is something wrong?"

" I just don't like you talking about it so casually." He grumbled. "I know I'm a werewolf, but you don't need to remind me."

"But…It's not a big deal."

His eyes grew in disbelief, "NOT a big deal?!"

He could not believe she was talking about the single, most horrible thing to ever happen to him without any sensitivity or awareness. He could not believe she had the nerve to sit there acting so clueless about what this possibly meant to him.

"How would YOU know, about it 'not being a big deal'?" He cried out bitterly. "How could you possibly know anything about what its really like?"

As soon as those words came out, he immediately regretted it. An awkward silence followed his furious words.

She sat there thinking to herself, before finally saying, "Because I'm a werewolf too."

Remus lifted his head up at these words and studied her closer. She stared back, wide-eyed and blank.

"No you're not…"

"Yes I am!"

"Someone would have told me."

"Why would they? No one talks about YOU being one all the time."

"Actually, a lot of people do. Reporters come in here sometimes."

"Well I'm pretty secretive about myself."

"People tell me I'm the youngest one in Britain right now."

"Except for me."

"I would have seen you transformed."

"Why do you think I disappear every now and then?"

Remus continued to stare at her. Even after being close friends, she was still hard to read.

But what she said about disappearing was true. Usually she was at the hospital every other day, but vanished sometimes for whole weeks.

"You don't disappear once a month though." He responded.

She stared up at the ceiling, thinking about whether this was true or not.

"No," She finally said. "I guess not."

"I knew it. You're NOT a werewolf."

A tiny flame of hope was at once extinguished. For a few moments, he jumped on the idea that someone could finally understand what he was going through. Even someone his own age.

But now he saw Stella was clearly lying.

"It's true. I'm not a werewolf," She admitted. "But really…how could you or anyone ever really know?"

She turned his shoulder around to face a mirror in the room. Remus looked at himself. Despite being slightly pale and tired looking, he was the same skinny, sandy-haired boy. The potion had reduced the hair on his arm and his sleeves hid his scars. A boy and girl stared back at him from the reflection. They were two children surrounded by playing cards, basking in afternoon sunlight. Two ordinary children.

"We look the same on the outside." She said softly. "If I saw you on the streets, I would never know anything."

A small light turned on inside of him. He smiled at his reflection, because he saw that she was right.


End file.
